BELFAST, Northern Ireland -- A gay couple have launched a High Court bid to have their marriage declared lawful in Northern Ireland.

The two men issued legal proceedings in a bid to secure a ruling that their relationship status should have equal recognition throughout the UK.

The couple, from Northern Ireland, were married in England after same-sex weddings became lawful there in March last year. But on their return home it was confirmed that they would still only have civil partnership status in the province.

NEW DELHI, India -- United Nations chief Ban Ki-moon has accused India of fomenting intolerance with its ban on gay sex amid uproar over a Goa minister's plans for centers to "make homosexuals normal."

Speaking in New Delhi, the UN chief referred to India's colonial-era law banning gay sex and said he "staunchly opposed the criminalization of homosexuality."

MANILA, Philippines — “Being a homosexual is not a sin. It is a state of a person.”

That was the response of Archbishop Socrates Villegas, president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines, to a question whether Pope Francis condemned members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transexual (LGBT) community.

Villegas, speaking during the Inquirer Conversations forum hosted by the Philippine Daily Inquirer on Monday, said the church had echoed time and again that Jesus Christ died for all people.

MEXICALI, Baja California, Mexico -- For the third time, Mexicali's civil registry is refusing to marry a gay couple whose wedding has been mandated by Mexico's Supreme Court.

Victor Manuel Aguirre and Fernando Urias have become martyrs for marriage equality in Baja California, trying since June 2013 to get hitched. But anti-gay forces and civil officials are being accused of colluding to postpone the inevitable after three tries.

HANOI, Vietnam -- Vietnam taking the lead in gay rights in Southeast Asia by abolishing a ban on same-sex marriage has medical doctor Thuan Nguyen planning a wedding ceremony with his boyfriend of two years.

“I am ready to have a wedding,” he said. “Many, many young people in love are optimistic about the acceptance of gay weddings.”

TURIN, Italy -- A court In Italy has recognized the legal status of a child born to a gay couple who were legally married in Spain.

The appeal court in Turin ruled that a child – conceived by artificial insemination and born in Barcelona to a Spanish and Italian lesbian couple – can be entered into the official records of the town where the Italian woman lives.

The ruling means the child, who was born in 2011, will have Italian citizenship and can go to Italy to be with the mother, who is divorced from her Spanish wife.

OSLER, Saskatchewan, Canada -- Two Saskatoon men are the first gay couple to marry in a Saskatchewan Mennonite church.

Craig Friesen and Matt Wiens were married by two Saskatoon pastors on Dec. 31 in an Osler, Saskatoon, Mennonite church.

"It's a privilege to know Matt and Craig and it was a privilege to be a part of their wedding," said Patrick Preheim, one of two Nutana Park Mennonite Church pastors who married the couple. The wedding is also a possible first for any Canadian Mennonite church.